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24
Oct
2009
Chris McCandless – A Reflection
Most of us live our lives tightly woven in the embrace of modern society. There are people like me who do manage to get away a few weeks in the year to the wilderness and throw off the shackles of technology and the conveniences of indoor plumbing and soft memory-foam beds, but even I am guilty of punching the clock and watching the world go by. Chris McCandless was an idealistic young man who shook off his shackles for good and set out to find himself and ultimately meet his end in the place he held so high.
Many of you will have probably read the Jon Krakauer book or seen the Sean Penn docu-drama film “Into The Wild” and know the general basis for this article while some of you may be reading about this for the first time. This amazing story (the film being based on the book) chronicles Chris McCandless from his comfortable suburban life and University education and follows his travels across America. Having given all of his money to charity, abandoning his 1970s Datsun B210 after it (and nearly he) was washed away in a flash flood, he set forth to his ultimate destination of Alaska. It was his ambition to live a period of solitude in the Alaskan countryside before returning to his life in society. Chris had no survival experience, very little money, and no means to get there. But that wouldn’t stop him.
Chris, renaming himself to Alexander Supertramp (a direct reference to the 1908 book The Autobiography of a Super-Tramp by William H. Davies), would make his way on foot to the far North. Along his way he would take any opportunity for exploration that he would encounter, almost always going into dangerous situations (such as canoing down the Colorado River into the Gulf of California) with very little preparation, experience, and equipment. For a time he worked in South Dakota in a grain mill where he began to prepare for his final destination and acquiring hunting and meat preservation tips from local hunters and friends. Having prepared, at least in his eyes, for his “Alaskan Odyssey,” he set for Fairbanks, Alaska where he bought a Remington Semi-Automatic .22LR (with 400 rounds), some very basic camping supplies (such as a sleeping bag, cooking pot, etc.), and a book on the local Alaskan flora and fauna.
6
Sep
2009
Gold Star Restaurant Doesn’t Receive Namesake
Usually I’ll take every new restaurant I try with a grain of salt (yes, the pun was intentional), but there’s only so far my taste buds and my patience can be pushed. Today my darling Gillian and I went out for a nice Sunday lunch at a place we haven’t tried before. We drove toward Coldbrook, Nova Scotia to try out one of the numerous restaurants we pass by when we drive toward the Coldbrook Drive-in Theatre and decided to stop off at The Gold Star Chinese & Canadian restaurant. We’re both huge fans of Chinese food and can never pass up a buffet. This place didn’t offer a buffet, but like I mentioned we were looking to try something different.
From the outside, The Gold Star has a rustic small-town kind of feel to it, something we both look for and enjoy. This wasn’t on purpose as when we walked inside, it’s as though we walked into 1977. But I’m not so superficial that I won’t eat at a restaurant because it hasn’t been renovated since it was built, but the immediate vibe I felt wasn’t a good one. Still, it’s only the look, so it doesn’t really matter that there was wooden “mack tack” (plastic sticky sheeting) everywhere and the bright red seats were held together by duct tape.
The waitress was the first issue. When a restaurant of any caliber has daily specials, the best way to let the customer know about them isn’t “the specials are in the menu.” That doesn’t sound very special to me, don’t you think? When she did take our orders, she did bring our Pepsi in only a minute or two. The Pepsi, straight from the can, came with one straw… We ordered two, but only one straw. I don’t drink with the straw anyway, but it’s not really her place to assume I don’t.
At every Chinese restaurant I’ve eaten at in my entire life, it’s never taken more than ten minutes for our food to arrive. After the first ten minutes of waiting, I received my egg roll as an appetizer and Gillian received her store-bought bread roll. The egg roll was older than myself, hard as a rock with one bite worth of cabbage on the inside with enough beef to take up the space that the end of my pinky finger does. We proceeded to wait another fifteen minutes as two other tables who came in long after we did got their food, one gentleman who came in five or seven minutes after we did ordered, ate, paid, and left before we got our “main course.”
21
Aug
2009
Hurricane Bill Precautions & Tips
Hurricane Bill is shaping up to be a strong storm by the time it hits Nova Scotia and the rest of the Atlantic Sea Board. At it’s peak, Bill was a Category Four hurricane (on an overall sale of one to five) with winds reaching upwards of 220 kilometers per hour. At this point, the hurricane has died down to a Category Three as it passes around the island of Bermuda on its North Western journey, and as it hits the even cooler waters of the Northern Atlantic it will continue to lose force.
But that doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods, in fact it’s quite the opposite. The North American “jet stream,” an invisible stream of air in the atmosphere, will interfere with Hurricane Bill and effectively steer it up the coast line and toward Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. At this point it’s far too early to predict where the hurricane will strike, which even with the difference of a few degrees can make a very different impact, but all models point to the hurricane getting uncomfortably close.
The hurricane is expected to get within striking distance in the morning hours of Sunday, August 23, with large swells (two or three meter high waves) reaching the coastlines on Saturday. The heaviest rains in the hurricane are to the left and closer to the eye (center) of the hurricane with expected amounts ranging from 50mm in the more distant reaches to up to 150mm the closer to the storm you get. Different sources are citing the hurricane may die down to a tropical storm level (much weaker winds, but still significant), but may retain a category one or even category two force of winds by Sunday. With having a hurricane at this point in the hurricane season (which officially lasts from June 1 until November 30) with the warmer waters and coupled with the more active weather we’ve been having as of late, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility to have the more powerful of the possibilities.
24
Jul
2009
Sad & Lonely People Need Lives
I always thought I was safe here at The Parade from the headaches caused at work (i.e. the Planet Half-Life Forums), but it’s the Internet, you’re not safe anywhere. I’m all for people disagreeing with my opinions, this is a free society (unless you’re visiting from China or something), so by all means, disagree and state your points. But people that find it necessary to get into fights over the Internet, let alone on some obscure personal blog found by some obscure RSS feed or something, are just sad.
Now I’ll admit, once upon a time I was like that. I was an angry little 14 year old once too, and I’d get into fights with text on the screen coming from some other anti-social little 14 year old. But then something happened… I grew up. No longer do I find it necessary to go to forums, IRC channels, or today’s new blogs to fight with people. That’s why I started The Parade. It was simply to be able to rant, post my opinions, or whatever and not have some little piss ant tell me how wrong I am, that I should grow up, and that I don’t know what I’m talking about. Here, of all places. At most I’ll get 2 or 3 dozen people visiting the site a day, most of whom are either coming from Wikipedia links or people I know clicking it off of my MSN status or Facebook page, so it’s exceedingly rare, but I guess it was bound to happen.
Lately, I’ve been trying to get rid of “john,” someone who made up a fake name and an obviously fake e-mail address (really, who could have been lucky enough out of millions of people to register “john@hotmail.com,” unless he [or she] is really that old) simply to tell me I was wrong about Michael Jackson. Time after time I’d respond to his grammatically incorrect comments, and time after time he’d come up with something else he’d call “proof” to show me how wrong I really was. So I told him (or her, I know one or two girls who wouldn’t be above going this far to argue with me for ‘ole time sake) that I was “fucking sick and tired of hearing about MJ,” and amongst other things I didn’t care. Guess what. “john” replied! He or she told me that “you seem to be getting agitated, you don’t see me getting that way. Grow up.” This person who comes to a scantly updated website who claims not to be a Michael Jackson fan daily to post arguments supporting him thinks someone else needs to grow up?
Well, “john,” and to everyone else who spends more time at a computer fighting with people then they do interacting with people outside of their basement, I have grown up. The only reason I replied to “john” is because, well, this is my site, it’s my duty to interact here. I don’t sit at my computer hitting the refresh button for “john” to respond, I go about my day at work, or spending time with my beautiful girl friend, or going out with my buddies for whatever activities seem fun at the time. If I want to get into a debate, I’ll do it face to face with someone, because people aren’t made out of electronic components with an LCD monitor for a face. The sooner people like “john” realize that, the sooner the obesity rate in North America will go down and people like me who work on the Internet can go to work without dreading what idiotic petty arguments people are going to engage in. So “john,” grow up. Go outside, I’m sure it’s a beautiful day! If you don’t have any friends to go have fun with, then go talk to your parents or siblings at least. Computers aren’t analogs for human beings. I learned that, why can’t you?
25
Mar
2008
Another Night Laying Awake
It’s 1:32am and I’m laying in bed again, thinking about life and its disappointments. I’m 21 and don’t really have much to show for my life, I don’t even have friends who want to actually see me; just the random casual Windows Live Messenger chat. So, what’s a poor Irish lad to do?
Well, I think I’ll be going to Kingstec in the fall for the Adult Learning Program to finally finish my degree. I love the Adult High School and everything, but I need to be somewhere that I can meet people and be social, and a school with 40 single moms and losers who wanted to be the rebels in high school isn’t exactly my kinda crowd, you know? I guess the bottom line is I just need to get out there more, make new friends, and eventually find a girl who won’t play head games with me like it was a sport.
That doesn’t leave much for right now, though. Sure I can spend a few bucks and take the bus to the mall and walk around like a bum or kick around downtown Wolfville, but that’s not really being social. What do I do, walk up to some random girl and say “hi, you don’t know me but I saw you sitting alone so I thought I’d say hi?” Not my style, I need context to talk to someone, such as in a class (since people always seem to think I can help them). So unless that stupid Plenty of Fish site turns up something, I’ll have a good half a year or so of sitting in my bedroom alone waiting for local businesses to call me back about jobs.
Speaking of POF, what the fuck is with girls on there? 4 out of 5 will outright ignore me when I message (you can see the status of sent messages) like they think they’re better than me. Well, I got news for you ladies; you’re stuck up and are missing out on someone who actually has a personality and just doesn’t want a wet place to stick it. I don’t get it though, they can’t all be stuck up, so is there something that unappealing about me that’s driving people away? I don’t know, but I wish I did.
17
Mar
2008
A New Chapter Begins
Justine and I called it quits a little while ago, and now I’ve completely distanced myself from her. She’s great and a great friend to have, but clambering on to the past only leads to frustration and hurt later down the road. Sure you can be friends with your ex’s, but if you put some time and distance between one another initially, it’ll make life so much easier in the end.
Speaking of “distance,” I’m never putting myself through that again. Jennifer frigging Aniston could call me up and says she wants me more than any man alive (take that Brad Pitt), but I honestly would turn her down. Okay, well, maybe not Jennifer Aniston, she’ll be my exception, but in the likely event it doesn’t pan out, I’m not dating outside of the immediate valley. Travel costs, distrust, missing one another… it’s simply not needed; it’s essentially online dating if you see each other once a month.
Not really sure what I’ll be doing from this point forward, but I’ll do something. I’m done with moping and dwelling on things in the past; whether it’s girl related, work related, or what have you. Life’s too short to be looking back on it constantly, you gotta live in the now and plan for the morrow.
Oh, and happy Saint Patrick’s Day. You’re not Irish today, only actual Irish people are, but you can celebrate the Patron Saint of Ireland… but I know everybody just uses it as an excuse to get drunk on green beer.
11
Mar
2008
I’m Back!
Break out the champagne and let the streamers go… Wait, there’s nobody here… Oh well, regardless, I’ve combined what was on my old site with a blog I started but forgotten about to make this new creation. You’ll find my actual writings (articles, essays, poems, etc.) along with my front-page rantings about whatever happens to piss me off at the time.
So enjoy your stay, read some stuff, maybe tell me what you think about it by leaving a comment.
1
May
2007
Let’s Start This Off
Well, I already have a web site, but it recieves no publicity (not sure how I’d approach that), plus manually updating everything and relying on FTP gets old when you’ve downgraded yourself to a weekend ranter… you should have heard me before! So, instead of writing and ranting to where nobody will ever see it – other the few people who actually read the notes I make on my FaceBook, I thought I’d sign up for a site that has a pretty good reputation, and maybe somewhere where fellow writers can interact with me, and of course, vice versa.
So, if you’re reading this, I bet you’re trying to figure out what my deal is, what’s my supposedly unique spin in an age where everyone has an opinion and a medium to express it. Well, in hindsight, I’m probably a lot like you. I see something that bugs me, thrills me, pleases me, or saddens me, and I want to express it. Convorsations with the majority of people my age (early twenties) is unstimulating and I usually spend more time explaining the meaning of words then I do discussing the topic at hand, so if you like an intellectual (to a extent) read and like to know how other people tick on something, then maybe you’re not wasting your time after all.
Well, all I can say is keep your eye open here at The Soft Parade, I plan on keeping this very up-to-date, at the very least a few new posts per week. Even if people don’t read this, it’s always a good thing to rant a little, don’t you think?
